Want to party liker it’s 1996? If you go to the movie theater this weekend, you can relive the glory days of the mid-’90s when Bill Clinton was president, your parents were still doing the Macarena, and Twister dominated the summer box office. Twisters, a sorta-sequel to that movie, is out, and will likely captivate audiences now as much as the original movie did all those years ago.
For those wishing to stay home, Amazon Prime Video is your best bet for streaming quality entertainment. The following three selections range from an underrated thriller starring Sigourney Weaver, a COVID-era horror movie, and a coming-of-age flick with a key member from the Stranger Things cast.
Death and the Maiden (1994)
Tension is best generated in confined spaces; just look at Alfred Hitchcock‘s Rear Window, which never leaves the cramped New York City apartment it’s set in. That’s partly why Death and the Maiden works so well. The movie, adapted from Alice Dorfman’s successful play, takes place in an isolated house in an unidentified South American country. It has three characters: Paulina Escobar (Sigourney Weaver), a housewife with a traumatic past; her husband, Gerardo (Stuart Wilson), a prominent lawyer; and Dr. Miranda (Ben Kingsley), a stranger whom Gerardo invites back to his house to wait out a thunderstorm.
Very quickly, Paulina realizes she knows Dr. Miranda and believes he was involved in a past event that still haunts her in the present. She’s so sure that she holds him captive to get him to confess. Did he do it? Or is Paulina crazy? After the movie ends, you’re still not quite sure what to believe, which is another reason why the movie is so effective. It’s ambiguous and haunting, and you won’t soon forget it.
Death and the Maiden is streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
The Last Matinee (2020)
Horror is hot right now with Longlegs and In a Violent Nature, but the genre has been cranking out nasty little numbers for decades now. Even COVID couldn’t prevent some under-the-radar horror movies from getting released, and The Last Matinee is among the best of the select bunch. It’s a Spanish-language slasher that draws its inspiration from the Italian Giallo classics of the ’70s and ’80s, so that means plenty of inventive kills, a barely-there plot, and an excellent use of light, shadow, and blood … lots and lots of blood.
The Last Matinee takes places on a rainy night in a largely empty movie theater playing, you guessed it, a cheesy horror movie. Unbeknownst to the moviegoers, which include an adulterous couple, a homeless man, a group of carefree teens, and a child sneaking in to watch something he shouldn’t, there’s a psychotic killer roaming the aisles, killing the theater’s staff and patrons one by one. Why? It doesn’t matter. This isn’t a movie to watch for its psychological depth; instead, it’s to be enjoyed with your hands barely covering your eyes as you witness one brutal murder after another.
The Last Matinee is streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Mermaids (1990)
Charlotte Flax is mortified by her mother. Teenagers usually are, but for Charlotte, it’s simply too much that her mom, Mrs. Flax, dresses in skimpy clothes (well, for 1963, anyway), sleeps around (usually with married men), and flouts conventions whenever and wherever she can. But she also secretly admires her, and since Mrs. Flax is played by Cher, it’s no hard task to see why. Wouldn’t you want to be around her, if only for a little while?
Mermaids takes place roughly within a momentous year for Charlotte, and America, as both go through growing pains: Charlotte falls in love; JFK is assassinated; the seasons change from fall to winter to spring; and Mrs. Flax … well, Mrs. Flax largely remains the same, for better or worse. This movie is quirky, but not in an annoying way, and the cast, which includes Winona Ryder as Charlotte, Christina Ricci as another daughter who is obsessed with swimming, and Bob Hoskins as a besotted love interest, is fantastic. It’s the kind of movie that leaves you with big dopey smile on your face throughout the whole thing.
Mermaids is streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
